First Annual Lecture in the Kyriakos Tsakopoulos Memorial Lectures of the Aristotle and the Moderns Series at Columbia University

First Annual Lecture in the Kyriakos Tsakopoulos
Memorial Lectures of the Aristotle and the Moderns
Series at Columbia University

About the Speaker

Nikiforos Diamandouros (B.A., Indiana, 1963; M.A., 1965, Columbia, M.Phil. 1969 & Ph.D. 1972) is, as of 1

April 2003, the European Ombudsman. From 1998 to 2003, he was the first National Ombudsman of Greece. He has also been Professor of Comparative Politics at the Department of Political Science & Public Administration, University of Athens, since 1993 (currently on leave). He has taught at SUNY, Columbia, and at the Juan March Center for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (Madrid). From 1983 to 1988, he was Program Director for Western Europe & the Near and Middle East at the Social Science Research Council. From 1988 until 1991, he was Director of the Greek Institute for International & Strategic Studies, Athens, a policy-oriented research organization established with joint funding from the Ford and MacArthur Foundations. He has served as President of the Greek Political Science Association (1992-98) and of the Modern Greek Studies Association of the United States (1985-88). From 1995 to 1998 he headed the Greek National Centre for Social Research (EKKE). In 1999 and 2000, he was appointed to Greece’s National Commission on Human Rights & the National Council for Administrative Reform respectively. He is also joint General Editor of the Series on the New Southern Europe (Johns Hopkins University Press) and recipient of Fulbright & NEH research grants. He has written extensively on the politics and history of Greece, Southern Europe and Southeastern Europe; on state and nation building, democratization, culture and politics.

About the Donor

In June 2004, Kyriakos Tsakopoulos ’93 presented a generous gift to Columbia University to establish the Kyriakos Tsakopoulos Chair in Hellenic Studies, in the Classics Department, as well as an annual lecture series entitled “Aristotle and the Moderns.” The gift was made as a tribute to his grandfather—for whom the Chair is named: “My grandfather exemplified what it was to have character and be a good man, and that’s what Aristotle teaches,” said Mr. Tsakopoulos. Mr. Tsakopoulos is President & CEO of KT Communities, a diversified land development company headquartered in Roseville, CA. He is responsible for the management and operation of several real estate, farming, building and land development projects and investments. Mr. Tsakopoulos is active in regional and national civic, charitable and political affairs. He is on the Board of Trustees of the California State University system and sits on the boards of several institutions, including the University of California MIND Research and Development Institute, Columbia College, Crocker Art Museum in Sacramento. Mr. Tsakopoulos trained as an attorney and is a member of the California and United States Supreme Court Bars.

‘Aristotle and The Moderns’ Lecture Series

The annual lecture series inaugurated this evening will focus on the importance and relevance of Aristotle’s teachings in today’s world, particularly with regard to his books, the Politics and the Nicomachean Ethics. “Our notions of justice and the importance of the rule of law, the definition of what it is to be a good person and a good citizen, are most eloquently and accurately described by Aristotle in these two books,” Mr. Tsakopoulos affirmed at the time of the establishment of the series. The annual public lecture will consider contemporary debates in broadly conceived, innovative, and multidisciplinary ways.

For more information about the series or the Program in Hellenic Studies

Inquiries to Program in Hellenic Studies:
(212) 854 5758/6988; eb609@columbia.edu

The Program in Hellenic Studies at Columbia Universitypresents the First Kyriakos Tsakopoulos Memorial Lecture in the series ‘Aristotle and the Moderns’ Nikiforos Diamandouros (The European Ombudsman), titled 'Rule of Law, Democracy and the Ombudsman in Contemporary Europe' on Monday, November 21st , 2005 at the President’s Room of the Faculty House at Columbia University (400 West 117th Street, New York, NY 10027, 6:00 p.m. Reception, 7.00 p.m. Lecture)

See also "Columbia University Establishes Chair in Hellenic Studies with Gift from Kyriakos Tsakopoulos" in the Hellenic Studies and Education section of HCS at the URL http://www.helleniccomserve.com/tsakopouloscolumbia.html.

HCS encourages readers to view other articles and releases in our permanent, extensive archives at the URL http://www.helleniccomserve.com/contents.html.